Mistletoe Midnight
by Z.Romance
Summary: Seto hasn't had the chance to embrace the Christmas spirit in a long time, and Kisara and Mokuba decide they have had enough of his missing out on the holiday. Annual holiday-fic. Republished under this pen name after originally being posted on another account.
1. Snow Ball Lights

**Hello, everyone. I never thought I'd be the type to write these holiday/season relevant fics, but Christmas just decided to have its way with me, and I wanted to write some fluff for Seto Kaiba anyway.**

**Note****: This story was originally published on December 18, 2010, under my Z. Quill pen name, but I decided it didn't really fit there (too fluffy and romantic), so it's been moved here.**

**Just a mild back-story: Seto and Kisara are already familiar with each other, and have been for a little over a year (during which Seto has mellowed out a bit), and they're at a stage where they're just one nudge away from falling for each other and becoming a couple. This is somewhat the future after my fic ****The One Friend of Seto Kaiba****, though there are no explicit references to it, and they could easily have absolutely nothing to do with each other. I only bring it up because my portrayals of Seto and Kisara are very similar in this fic as in that one while they are a bit different in others. **

**Please enjoy Mistletoe Midnight!**

_December 18, 2010. 10: 36 p.m._

"Home, sir?" The Kaiba chauffer inquired form the front seat.

"Where else would we be going?" Seto growled back.

"Yes, sir." The chauffer pulled the limo into traffic from the Kaiba Corp. lot, in the direction of the Kaiba mansion, headlights glancing off happy Christmas shoppers enjoying the downtown nightlife. Domino may not be known for a lot, but two things it had going for it were Duel Monsters and its world-renowned nocturnal bustle. Many of the shops downtown didn't even close for the night.

Seto rubbed his forehead, trying to make the imminent headache caused by his day wait until he had access to some aspirin. The holiday season was always difficult, but it seemed to get worse and worse every year. Frankly, Seto was surprised he was able to leave Kaiba Corp. as soon as he did.

Sighing, Seto lifted his head from his hand, looking out the window of the moving limo. A light snow was starting up, continuing to blanket everything once again in a layer of white after the true bucketing had been taken care of earlier in the week, canceling the schools and starting Winter Break up several days prematurely.

Domino City officials had put up the seasonal decorations: Strings of lights were strung along and across the streets, the occasional tree or streetlight was draped in tinsel, giant ornaments hung from the power lines, and various other sorts of holiday extravagances spiced up the normally fairly drab façade of inner Domino.

Mokuba had mentioned something about the city park this year being especially well done up, but Seto hadn't had the time to go check it out himself.

As the headlights had shown, the light snow and temptation of holiday goodies had brought out a throng of shoppers, partygoers, and people who just plain wanted to enjoy the winter dusting.

Seto hadn't really experienced the Christmas Spirit since he'd taken over his adoptive father's company, and even before that, Gozaburo hadn't exactly been the type to encourage the warmth and love the Christmas was supposed to bring, blah, blah, blah.

But, even Seto started to feel a tickle of Yuletide cheer as he slipped through the lit-up avenues and caught glimpses of the purchases people were making for friends and loved-ones…

And, it continued until he came across a store that sold Kaiba Corp. products that had a sign in its window saying that it was sold-out of almost everything that KC had supplied them with.

The progress of the headache sped up ten-fold as the implications of a store _this close_ to Kaiba Corp. headquarters already being out of stock a week from Christmas meant for the company world-wide.

Seto contemplated telling the driver to turn around so that he could get a jump on this problem before it got the jump on him, but he decided against it. So far, this one little store was the only one that Seto knew of having supply difficulties, and even Seto wasn't enough of a workaholic to not see the ease with which he could put it off until tomorrow.

Seto closed his eyes again and brought both hands up to massage his temple. '_Merry Christmas' my ass._

_December 18, 2010. 11:04 p.m._

Seto headed straight for the kitchen and the aspirin bottle once he was home. On his way, he didn't bother turning on any lights, knowing the route to the kitchen step-by-step even in the dark.

He went about the room without a thought, the routine being so familiar that his actions needed no direction. He ended up standing in front of one of the kitchen windows, staring out onto the back lawn as he drank the familiar capsules down.

He almost choked when he saw a figure moving around in the dark, and if it weren't for the figure's diminutive height, Seto would have thought it was some sort of intruder.

As it was, the only person Seto knew who was 4' 8" was Mokuba, who _should_ have been up in his room, not gallivanting around in the dark, all alone.

_What's he doing out there?_

Seto set the glass of water he'd been drinking from down on the counter and headed back into the hallway that led to the kitchen, and down to the side door that led to the outside.

He stepped out onto a miniature, covered porch, noticing the door was already unlocked when it normally was secured.

Seto, closing the door only partially behind him, keeping a finger on the switch for the porch light inside, looked around the yard, squinting, having lost sight of what had to be Mokuba wandering around.

"Wow," a voice said just in front of him, their tone on the verge of sarcastic. "You're home by eleven. That must be a record for the two weeks before Christmas, wouldn't you say?"

Seto turned the porch light on with a flick of his wrist to find his little brother standing there, hands on his hips, and face turned off to the side with a smug twist to his lips and eyebrows.

"Shouldn't you be in bed?" Seto asked Mokuba, taking in his little brother's now-lit bundled-up appearance, from the snow boots and waterproof mittens, all the way up to the cheeks red from the cold and snowcap complete with fuzzy pompom.

Mokuba pouted. "There's not even school tomorrow," he argued. "Anyway, I've been being productive, _Scrooge_." The smug look was back again.

"Doing what?" Seto was suspicious, but he was also a little amused. Whenever something like this went on with his little brother, there was usually something pretty interesting going on in the background.

"Decorating." Seto raised his eyebrow.

"Oh?"

"Yeah. Inside, outside, all-around."

"I thought we hired people for that."

Mokuba snorted, never having liked that pathetic Christmas practice that had been going on in the Kaiba family even before they'd arrived. "Yeah, well, we only do that because one of us alone wouldn't be able to do much, even though if just _one_ other person helped out, _everything_ would get done in just a couple of days." Mokuba gave Seto a pointed look that had Seto making a face, as if he'd tasted something rotten. He didn't exactly feel guilty about not helping with the Christmas trimming and garnishing, or whatever, but he did feel guilty about leaving Mokuba alone to do it all.

"But, I decided to try anyway this year. Plug that in," Mokuba commanded, pointing at an electrical cord that was resting just a few feet from Seto. "And, turn off the porch light!" Mokuba was suddenly running away from the porch, becoming impossible to tell apart from the darkness once Seto turned the light off.

Letting his eyes adjust to the darkness, Seto knelt down to cautiously pick up the cord. He wasn't exactly mistrustful of Mokuba, but he never liked plugging or pressing something when he wasn't sure exactly what he'd be causing by doing so. Nevertheless, Seto plugged in the cord.

All of a sudden, several trees in the backyard of the Kaiba house lit up, each a different color and one with a ladder still leaning against it.

"Ta da!" Mokuba shouted from the middle of the yard, no longer indistinguishable from the darkness with the trees blazing around him.

Seto didn't know whether to be proud of his brother for getting so much done, and done _well_, on his own, or to _strangle_ him for getting up on a ladder with no one around to make sure he didn't fall or to call an ambulance when he did.

Moving to the very edge of the porch, Seto dangerously asked in silky tones, "And, _how_ exactly were you able to accomplish all of this?" Whatever answer Mokuba gave, he was going to be so dead and so grounded. But, as it was, Mokuba wasn't the one who gave the answer.

"He had help," was all the warning Seto got before the ice-cold ball of snow smacked right into the side of his head.

A crow of delighted laughter slipped from Mokuba's lips before he quickly slammed his mittenned hands over his mouth.

Slowly, slowly Seto turned around to face his assailant.

"Kisara. I'm surprised I didn't see you," Seto gritted out, feeling drips of melting snow trickling under his coat and shirt, down his neck and then spine.

"Well, I do blend in pretty well this time of year," she teased, tossing her fair hair over her shoulder. It was true, and the fact that she was almost entirely dressed in white didn't help a bit. Great camouflage for winter sneak attacks.

"Stop giving me that look, Seto. It was just a snowball, and if you don't stop glaring, I'm going to throw another one," she mock-warned.

"Let me have some fun too, Kisara," Mokuba spoke up. Seto gave his little brother his own _look_. "Uh, I'll just go make sure that snowman hasn't melted yet." He scurried further away from the porch, deeper into the winter wonderland.

"Snowman?" Seto asked, looking back at Kisara, now coming to stand beside him.

"Yes. It's a good one, too. The both of us were able to lift the middle ball completely intact onto the bottom one and not have to go through that mangling procedure of chopping it up and rebuilding it piece by piece, then having to pack it all together and turning it into some deformed thing that needs to be remade again… You look really confused, Seto," she finally commented, stopping her blabbering and the gesturing she'd been making to go along with her descriptions.

"I can't even remember the last time I made a snowman," Seto confessed.

"Mokuba couldn't remember the last time you had, either," Kisara stated in consternation.

"So sorry for my lack of time," Seto snipped.

"You have time now," she pointed out. "And, there's plenty of snow left," she said, gesturing to the expansive back property of the Kaiba estate.

"At eleven at night?"

"Yes, Seto. Mokuba says you stay up later doing boring paperwork. You can spend an hour, at least, frolicking in the snow with Mokuba and me. And, besides," she spoke as she backed off of the porch and onto the snowy lawn, a wicked smile curving her lips, "I'd bet you're just _dying_ to pay me back for that snowball to the head."

He watched her take several more steps back and pause about eight feet away before shaking his head in disbelief at his own actions and taking his own step forward into the gleaming snow.

"You'd better run, snowgirl," Seto warned before swooping down and snatching up a handful of snow.

Letting out a delighted laugh, Kisara turned and tore across the lawn, yelling, "Run, Mokuba!"

He shouted back, "I told you this was a bad idea!" before making his own dash past the vibrantly colored trees in the yard, unable to keep his laughter in.

Seto's first snowball hit Kisara square in the middle of her back, causing her to spin and duck to make her own ammunition.

Suddenly, Seto changed his course, ducking behind a tree shrouded in minute cobalt blue lights, and waiting to tell which direction she was coming from. He should have been paying more attention to where Mokuba was.

Another snowball smacked Seto just off-center of his chest, and he looked up to see Mokuba darting behind a tower of mandarin orange lights.

Making use of the perfectly compactable snow, Seto made two quick snowballs, and first dealt with Kisara who'd just come around the side of the tree, hitting her leg while she missed him by a mile, and then making off after Mokuba.

Another of Kisara's snowballs grazed his arm, encouraging him to pick up the pace. As he rounded the tree, he barely escaped a face full of flying snow courtesy of Mokuba's aim, but got him back by diving forward and snatching the hat of his little brother's head and replacing it with the wad of snow he'd had in-hand.

"Ah, Seto! Why not just white-wash me?" Mokuba griped sarcastically, backing out of his brother's grip and shaking his hair out.

"Now, _that's_ a good idea." Seto chuckled lowly, taking a step forward.

"NO!" Mokuba squealed in false fear.

He scrambled to get away from his big brother, but both were distracted when their forgotten guest successively hit them each in the face and neck respectively.

"You seem to specialize in headshots," Seto muttered darkly at the thrower, wiping the snow off his cheek.

"Indeed. Be forewarned. Don't ignore me just because I'm not a terrifying, tyrant of a Kaiba," Kisara declared stridently. Mokuba caught her chin with a close range snowball, and, after a pause, Kisara dove for him, tackling him to the ground into a mass of squeal and giggles, kicking up flurries of snow as they rolled around.

Seto took the time to dodge around an emerald-lighted tree, knowing they' be in hot pursuit once they realized he'd vanished.

Sure enough, their squabbling stopped, and Seto heard Mokuba shout, "After him!"

Seto actually had to hold in a laugh. God, when was the last time he'd done something like this? Something just for fun? Just like with the snowman, Seto couldn't remember.

At least, his headache was gone.

_December 18, 2010. 11:57 p.m._

Seto crouched behind a tree glittering in tones of purplish-blue, waiting for his prey to walk by.

It would probably be one of the last skirmishes of the night. All three of the combatants were out of breath and soaked through with the melted snow. The last time Seto had seen Mokuba, the thirteen-year-old had begun shivering unstoppably, but had rushed back off into the night before Seto could comment on it.

Now, whoever came around the corner would be ambushed, and then commissioned into helping find the final player in the game so that they could all go inside and warm up before Seto sent Mokuba to bed and Kisara…

_I should offer to let her stay here for the night._

After all, it was late, his driver had gone home, and there weren't any taxis in this upper class, isolated part of Domino. He could drive her home himself, but he also was getting tired and was not unaware of the statistics showing drowsy driving being as dangerous as drunken.

Kisara was the one to come around the tree, already knowing he was there, arm raised high with snowball ready to be let go. Seto let his own ammo drop to the frozen ground, and to prevent her from getting him, leaped forward and wrapped his arms around her catching her arms in the embrace and pinning them to her sides.

Kisara began laughing and shrieking jovially, letting the wad of snow fall from her grasp as she tried to untangle herself from Seto, winding up with her back pressed against his front and his arms still tightly bound around her.

"Okay, okay, you win," she admitted, still giggling to herself.

"I know," he whispered into her ear. Kisara kept on giggling.

Eventually, she quieted, and they just stood there, Seto's arms around her, his face unintentionally buried in her hair. She relaxed against him and brought her hands up, placing them on his forearms where they crossed over her waist.

It wasn't until Seto felt Kisara begin to shiver that he sighed into her snow white locks and undraped himself off of her, disturbing the peace that had been so easy to cultivate between them.

"We need to go find Mokuba, then head inside before either of you freeze to death," he said as she turned around to face him, still in close quarters.

"Hm," she hummed, agreeing with him, before bringing up a gloved hand to stroke his cheek.

Seto shivered upon contact with the cold glove, getting a smile out of Kisara.

"Mokuba and I aren't the only ones susceptible to the cold, Seto Kaiba," she ribbed.

He chuckled lightly. "I suppose you're right."

They began making their way back to the house, walking close beside each other, winding through the sparkling, multicolored trees.

"Mokuba is so lucky that he had someone helping him with this," Seto growled, catching sight of a tree decked in frosted pink lights, the one with the ladder still leaning against it. "Why did you come by anyway?" he asked.

"I just wanted to see you. And, since you weren't here, I decided to help out Mokuba." She shrugged.

"Hey!" a voice called. Mokuba waved at them from the porch, where the light was now burning brightly.

Kisara and Seto waved back to him.

"I'm going inside!" he informed them before turning back to the door and entering.

"He could have at least waited for us," Seto muttered.

Kisara giggled again.

They made their way back across the yard, over the many tracks they'd made running back and forth, trying to catch or evade each other.

Reaching the porch, Seto tugged on the door. Then, again, he tried when it failed to unlatch. "It's locked," he growled. It was possible that the door had locked on its own after Mokuba went inside, but Seto had the feeling that this was Mokuba's last move in the bitter battle of the blizzard: locking himself and Kisara out

"Sneaky little boy," he heard Kisara mutter under her breath.

"More like a spoiled wretch," Seto corrected, glaring at the unyielding door, giving it a kick.

"That's not quite what I was referring to."

Looking over at her, he saw Kisara looking up at the ceiling sheltering the small porch. Looking upward as well, Seto caught sight of a bunching of plant-life that was no doubt Mokuba's idea of a joke.

Mistletoe.

_December 19, 2010. 12:00 a.m._

Seto sighed. Mokuba no doubt had seen them and decided to take matters into his own hands, racing back to the house and digging out some of the mistletoe to put up, and then luring them to the door so that they would have no chance but to stand underneath the holiday plant.

"Personally, I am strongly opposed to breaking any sort of Christmas tradition," Kisara said, glancing over at Seto.

Seto looked her in the eyes, seeing that she was actually serious about this.

"And, I realize that _you_ don't mind ignoring traditions, but maybe you should give this one a chance," she continued, turning to face him, a mischievous gleam in her eyes.

Slowly, a devilish smile came to Seto's lips. "Maybe I could."

Taking a step close to her, Seto wrapped an arm around her waist, pulling her close to him.

Wrapping her arms around his neck, Kisara giggled. "I never thought I'd ever have a mistletoe kiss," she murmured.

"Me neither."

Gently, Seto used his free hand to tilt Kisara's chin up. And, even more gently, Seto lowered his head, until, finally, his lips touched hers, and they kissed under the mistletoe.

Pulling away, Seto moved his lips to her ear and whispered, "Merry Christmas."

**Thanks for reading! I know that the ending's somewhat abrupt, but I couldn't think of where to take it from there. Anyway, I'm going to make this into a Christmas tradition sort of thing, so it'll be updated every year.**

**I hope that everyone has a happy holiday season, no matter what holiday it is. And, I look forward to seeing you next year for another round!**


	2. Christmas Cake

**Obviously, I have ended up posting this story on my romantic account. I should have just done that in the first place, but I was still getting used to what divided each of my accounts into what they are and what goes in them. Anyway, after a year of waiting, on with the fic!**

_December 24__th__, 2011, 7:34 p.m._

"Okay, we did it. Can we go?"

"Come on, Seto. Look at all the snow we have left. And, Kisara isn't here yet, so no, we can't go."

"It's _cold_ out here."

"Well, it's _winter_. Jeez, who knew you were such a complainer? Enjoy it, Seto! You didn't get to last year," Mokuba pointed out. He was already kneeling in the snow again, starting in on the next giant snow ball for the next snowman. "Anyway," Mokuba went on, "don't you think he needs a friend?" Mokuba jerked his head past Seto, at the carrot-nosed, top-hatted figure beyond him, the pompom on the top of his knit cap bobbing with the motion.

"Mokuba," Seto started slowly, "it's a _snowman_. He has no brain to be lonely with."

"It's the heart that gets lonely, Seto," Mokuba corrected, smiling.

"He doesn't have one of those, either," Seto grumbled, crossing his arms in front of him and hunching his shoulders, trying to keep his gloved hands warm, scornfully keeping his back turned to the snowman he'd been conned into building.

Mokuba paused in his snowball making to tug his bangs to the side from under his pompom-topped hat. He looked over at his brother, standing and shivering in the cold, and got a sneaky, smug look on his face. "I'll bet you warm up when Kisara gets here," he leered.

Seto narrowed his eyes and kicked snow at him. "Get your mind out of the gutter."

Mokuba snickered as Seto flipped out his cell phone and began texting.

"Oh, _nice_, Seto. Nothing drains the holiday spirit like—"

"—like having to freeze one's ass off," Seto finished, sending the message, not caring if it breached Christmas etiquette. He received a reply almost immediately, read it, and nodded to himself. "I'm going inside. You can stay out here and get frostbite if you want," Seto sneered, already backing away towards the mansion, "but it's _so_ not worth it to stay out here."

Mokuba pursed his lips and frowned at his Scrooge of a brother. "But, Kisara—"

"She's meeting me in the kitchen. She says she has a project for us." Seto shrugged, not having a clue as to what "project" could mean, and turned, rushing to the back door with its miniature porch where Seto and Kisara had shared their first kiss ever so slightly over a year ago. Seto felt his lips curving up at the corners at the memory and did feel a little bit warmer. That didn't mean he was going to stay out in the cold to wait for his girlfriend, no matter how much he cared about her, when there was a warm kitchen waiting for him.

He slammed the door shut behind him once he entered, figuratively telling the cold to stay the hell out. It hadn't been as bad when he was physically taking part in building the snowman, but just standing outside, doing nothing while he waited for Kisara to appear.

He stamped his boots clean of snow on the mat inside as he ripped his gloves off and threw them across to the kitchen island. He then unwound the dark blue, practically black, scarf Kisara had given him last Christmas, hanging it on the coat rack next to the back door. Shrugging off his trench coat, he hung it next to the scarf and walked over to sit on one of the stools set up next to the counter.

"Ugh." He had absolutely no doubt his nostril hair was frozen.

* * *

_December 24__th__, 2011, 7:51 p.m._

Seto was finally feeling thawed when the back door burst in, bringing a draft of cold air in to ruin Seto's warm kitchen island oasis.

"I'm _back_," Kisara said in greeting, smiling rakishly. She was here nearly every other day, but Seto found that that was not nearly often enough at times.

"Good," he said in response, getting up to greet her.

"Sit down!" Kisara ordered, causing Seto to freeze.

He watched suspiciously, halfway between standing and sitting as Kisara set the grocery bag she'd had balanced on her hip on the counter across the way and Mokuba came in, laden with two more brown paper sacks.

Resettling on the stool, Seto said, "I'd assume this was the project you mentioned."

"Yup," both Kisara and Mokuba confirmed. Kisara bobbed her head, her white hair catching the light. It may just have been a trick of the white Christmas lights that Mokuba had strung up throughout the room (he'd been forbidden to deck the trees outside this year, Kisara's help or no), but it almost looked as if frost had gathered in the long locks.

Seto's eyes narrowed as a bit of understanding came upon him. "You were in on this too, then, Mokuba?"

Mokuba grinned like a kid who'd gotten caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

"I came up with the idea," Kisara spoke up, beginning to unload one of the bags. "Mokuba just happened to jump on it when I mentioned it aloud."

"It's going to be fun. Plus, we've never done anything like this before that I can remember. Why not do it now?" Mokuba babbled excitedly.

"Do _what_ now?" Seto asked, playfully impatient. He switched between two different outlooks when it came to Mokuba and Kisara having forged such a tight bond, that more often than not manifested itself through the two being partners in crime. The first take was annoyance tinged with jealousy. Kisara was _his_ girlfriend after all, _not_ Mokuba's, and having the two of them working so closely together, often against or involving Seto without his knowledge, could get under his skin. But, normally, Seto was just grateful he'd finally wound up with someone who Mokuba didn't detest on sight and didn't find Mokuba an irritating tagalong in turn. They liked each other and Seto loved each of them, and that was enough to fend off the displeasure he would feel on occasion.

"What's that silly smile on your face for?" Kisara teased.

"Never you mind," was Seto's response.

"Well, in answer to your previous question," Mokuba took over, "we're going to be making a Christmas cake."

Seto raised a single brow. "A cake."

"A _Christmas_ cake," Mokuba corrected.

"The 'Christmas' part is extremely important," Kisara backed him up, placing a box of cake flour on the counter.

"I'm not helping," Seto suddenly declared, getting up and making for the hallway and the rest of the giant house.

"Oh, come on, Seto!" Mokuba whined, whirling on him.

"Yeah, Seto, come on," Kisara reiterated, a small frown creasing her brows. Every now and then Seto's severe and joyless personality would catch her off-guard. But, she always managed to bring him around, one way or another… most of the time.

Seto shook his head. "I won't be eating any of it, so I don't see why I should have to make it. Anyway, it's too late to be doing any sort of baking."

"How would you know?" Mokuba muttered as he made his way over to the cupboards where the pots and pans were stored. "And, since when is nine, or even ten going to be considered _late_ for a Kaiba?"

Kisara was full-out scowling at Seto. "Are you saying you aren't going to be eating my cooking?" She asked slowly, causing Mokuba to pause in what he was doing and look back at her, almost in awe-inspired fear.

Seto blinked and his eyes hardened slightly at her near-confrontational tone of voice.

"Yeah. That is, indirectly, what I'm saying."

Kisara got an interesting smile on her face, one that wasn't pleasant but wasn't anywhere near ugly either. "We'll see about that."

She turned back to the bags and continued removing items from them: confectioners' sugar… vanilla extract… a cookbook… a couple of oranges…

Seto watched her for several more moments. A year of them being officially a couple hadn't yet been enough time for each of them to completely figure each other out. No number of years would, not that Seto wanted to admit that, but a single year was still a particularly obscure time. Right now, Seto had no idea what to make of Kisara's sudden insult over his not wanting to eat a cake she and Mokuba hadn't even made yet. He wasn't a cake person; she should know that by now.

Still apprehensive, Seto backed out of the room, leaving Kisara and Mokuba to their sugary task.

* * *

_December 24__th__, 2011, 11:12 p.m._

Seto hadn't realized he'd fallen asleep until the dream he was having began to involve talking snowmen and a cake that had its heart set on eating _him_.

He jerked awake after the cake took its third bite, from his leg this time, to the sound of the grandfather clock in the room ticking the seconds away. He rubbed the spot to make sure the flesh that as supposed to be there still was.

He unfolded himself from the recliner he'd drifted off in, wondering if maybe he _might_ be putting in too many hours at Kaiba Corp. to be falling asleep at eight or so at night. _Nah_.

Stretching, he caught a delicious scent drifting through the house. Sweet almonds mixed with something tangy and fruity... with a darker, lingering smell just underneath.

_Not bad_, Seto thought.

He leisurely walked back to the kitchen, catching sight out of an upper story window of the lone snowman in the backyard, its unfinished companion forgotten mid-birth nearby. He shuddered slightly, not even remembering what it had said, but having gotten a distinct feel of the tin man from the Wizard of Oz. Or, maybe it had been the scarecrow? Either one, it had been oddly disturbing to him. There was no way in hell that Mokuba was ever being allowed to build another snowman ever again.

Laughter poured out of the living room as Seto made his way downstairs (it was amazing even to him how far the scent of the cake had carried). He came to the doorway and looked in. Mokuba was sitting on the floor, cutting himself a giant slab of cake from the double-layered, cream, green, and red colored dessert in from of him. Kisara already had hers and looked like she was enjoying it, tri-colored frosting and pure white insides both. The look of absolute delight on her face a the taste of it didn't so much make Seto wonder what he was missing as make him think that Kisara was getting entirely too much of it… from a cake.

"Look who was tempted down by our cake, Kisara," Mokuba spoke up, catching Seto watching them.

Kisara hummed, but didn't even turn to look at her boyfriend.

"I came down to escape a nightmare that involved cake, actually," Seto imperiously informed them, leaning against the doorframe. Squinting at the cake, Seto asked, "What are those flecks in the frosting?"

"Orange zest," Mokuba answered before stuffing a giant forkful of Christmas cake into his awaiting, cavernous maw. "Mmmmmmmmmm. That's so good," he said, spitting crumbs all over the floor.

"Don't talk with your mouthful," both Seto and Kisara playfully reprimanded. Mokuba rolled his eyes and grabbed for a napkin form the pile they'd thought to bring out with them. Seto tried to catch Kisara's eye in a conspiratorial exchange of glances, but she refused to look at him.

Was she seriously going to start a fight with him on Christmas Eve over _cake?_ Was it really that big of a deal? Seto glared at her as Mokuba started relating the experience Seto missed out on. _He_ seemed to have forgiven him.

His little brother went into detail about how they'd decided at the last minute to change the frosting they were going to use, choosing orange cream cheese over butter cream. They wound up having to squeeze the oranges themselves for juice and Mokuba had cut himself on the grater while getting the zest from the orange peel. Then, they'd forgone reading the directions beyond the quantities of unsalted butter, cream cheese, vanilla extract, confectioners' sugar, and orange juice and zest, not reading the part that said _specifically_ that this frosting wasn't meant for layer cakes as it wasn't stiff enough. Apparently, Mokuba now viewed Kisara as a hero for not panicking and simply started adding more of the confectioners' sugar to stiffen it up. And, it still tasted good!

With a sly look in his eye as he finished, Mokuba asked his elder brother, "You want to try some?"

Seto shifted his eyes to Kisara once again. She still hadn't looked at him and he was getting peeved as well as anxious. He wanted her attention!

"_Fine_," he spat. Mokuba's eyes widened to twice their normal size, but still Kisara didn't stir. Seto marched across the room, snatched the fork from Mokuba's hand, sticking it directly into the cake itself, and then shoving a section even bigger than Mokuba's bite had been into his mouth. He nearly gagged himself on the hugely sized piece, but he had to admit that his brother and Kisara were right: it was a very good cake.

Shooting a glare at her as he chewed, having to balloon out his cheeks like a chipmunk to accommodate the amount of food he'd just taken in as well as the motion, Seto saw that Kisara was finally looking at him as she sucked some lingering frosting from the tines of her fork.

Her shoulders were shaking uncontrollably and, behind Seto, Mokuba was full-out laughing, not even bothering to hide his amusement.

Switching his gaze between the two as he continued to chew, Seto began to get an awful feeling in the pit of his stomach that had nothing to do with the glorious food. It was the feeling that he'd just been duped.

* * *

_December 24__th__, 2011, 11:52 p.m._

Kisara entered the room with the grandfather clock where Seto was curled up in his recliner bearing what Seto would very shortly come to learn was a peace offering.

Hardly giving him a chance to register her presence, Kisara walked right up to the chair and plopped herself down on top of him, forgoing any attempts on his part to escape. Seto's still pissed off eyes shot daggers at her as she smiled, satisfied, down at him.

"It was just a silly little bet, Seto," she said gently, a slightly mocking light not leaving her eyes quite enough to make Seto actually believe her.

"A bet to see who could make the biggest fool out of me?" he hissed, not ready yet to let go of his embarrassed anger.

"In part."

Seto kept his jaw from dropping at her frank admission through sheer determination alone. How dare she?

"But, we also just wanted to get you into the Christmas spirit," Kisara added.

"By turning me into a laughing stock."

Kisara had the nerve to sigh in exasperation. "It was only me and Mokuba, not the entire city, or even the neighborhood."

She snuggled up to him, wriggling herself under his unforgiving chin and forcefully wrapping one of his arms around her. "We got through to you last year by making you frolic around in the snow with us. We tried, or Mokuba tried, to get you to do that again this year, but it apparently wasn't working, so we went on to Plan B, and then Plan C, which was the same, only it involved me giving you the silent treatment when you refused to bake with us. You caved a lot faster than we thought you would, to be honest."

Kisara had almost had him on her side until that last sentence. Seto made to push her off his lap and onto the floor, but Kisara anticipated his retaliation and twisted herself around and above him, giving her the higher ground.

She slammed a lidded tin tub down on his chest, shocking him into momentary submission.

"What the hell is that?" he asked, unable to stop himself.

"It doesn't take four hours to make a cake, Seto. Even if there is a minor mix-up with the frosting," Kisara told him. Opening the tin, Kisara was suddenly pressing something against his lips.

"Open up," she commanded.

Seto thought she should have known better than to try to get him to eat anything else, but he was suddenly caught by the exceptionally gentle, sweet, benevolent expression that she wore.

"If you eat this," she began, "I, at least, will never force you into an embarrassing situation again without _some_ sort of warning of what's coming, okay?"

It really wasn't all that great of a deal, but whatever Kisara was holding to his tightly clamped mouth smelled exceedingly delicious, and Seto didn't like staying made at her. It was one of the things he found out during their year together.

He opened his mouth and let Kisara slip in a moist piece of dark chocolate fudge. It was _amazing_.

* * *

_December 25__th__, 201, 12:00 p.m._

Seeing Seto's look of ecstasy at the fudge, Kisara smiled and reached back into the tin just as the old grandfather clock began chiming the hour: midnight.

"Are you finally in the Christmas spirit?" she asked on the third dong of the bell.

Begrudgingly, Seto conceded, "I might be."

Her smile broadened. "Then, my work here is done."

Holding the hand that had been rummaging in the tin of fudge above her head, Kisara revealed a sprig of mistletoe.

"Merry Christmas, Seto Kaiba." A wicked light began to dance in her eyes. "Now, let me have a taste of that fudge."

**Thanks for reading!**

**The next update will be sometime around the Christmas of 2012 ^-^. Hopefully, I'll get to hear from you guys before then.**


	3. Shopping and Chasing

**This was supposed to be published yesterday, but today is fine too. Enjoy this year's chapter!**

_December 23, 2012, 8:54 p.m. _

Seto felt like a freak in the scarf, hat, and sunglasses get-up. Everyone who caught sight of him knew that they were either looking at a celebrity in hiding or a shoplifting case waiting to happen. He hoped they came to the second conclusion.

He still couldn't believe that he'd been forced to come shopping at the mall. Something about it being punishment for his being such a stick-in-the-mud last year when it came to last Christmas Eve's baking. At least it wasn't Christmas Eve itself now, but the stores were still hugely crowded with last-minute shoppers. He kept bumping into people and getting bumped in return.

Finally he just had to say to hell with the sunglasses and stuffed them in one of his coat's pockets. He doubted anyone would recognize him at this stage of buying-panic and in such a crowd anyway.

Kisara looked over at him in sympathy, a concealing hat of her own covering her distinctive hair, as they climbed onto an escalator, along with a dozen other people. It had really been Mokuba's idea to come to the mall, but he'd disappeared a half hour ago, saying he was getting some things that Kisara and Seto couldn't be seeing until Christmas.

"Can we go home now?" he asked again, eyeing a bratty kid a few stairs down who was throwing a tantrum, wishing he could do the same. Coal in his stocking be damned.

Kisara chuckled at the mutinous look on his face. "I need to visit a counter at Macy's first, and then we need to find Mokuba, and then there's one last little store I need to visit." Seto groaned.

He was an online shopper at heart, and that was only when he even felt like he needed something, swinging between the minimalist and extravagant ends of the spectrum at a whim. Even though it was the busiest season for Kaiba Corp., and even though he was horrendously rich, and even though it was two days until Christmas, really just one, he was feeling acutely cheap and anti-retail therapy at the moment.

And Kisara knew it. "Look, I'll swing by Macy's and my other store. You go find Mokuba, and we'll be ready to go sooner rather than later."

"Good deal." He was glad he was with someone who could read him so easily and not make such a big deal out of it when she did. He just wished he could get inside her head a little more often and show her that he understood her just as well.

They reached the top of the escalator and gave each other's hand a quick squeeze before splitting off.

_If I were a scheming, teenage little brother let loose in the mall, where would I be?_ Seto asked himself. Well, he'd be finding the quickest way home. Mokuba… food court? A&F? Not Macy's.

Seto decided to try the food court first. All roads of the mall led back to the food court.

He'd been staked out in front of the Cinnabon for a few minutes when he got a text from Mokuba.

'_Met up with some friends. Will find own way home. Feel free to leave now!'_

Seto rolled his eyes, vaguely wishing he'd had the idea to bail first. He was just about to leave when he saw Mokuba himself come around the corner of a Hot Topic. He had several people in tow with him, most of them girls.

Mokuba was turning into a ladies' man.

Seto grinned sadistically to himself before taking a picture of the scene with his phone. What wonderful blackmail.

* * *

_December 23, 2012, 9:16 p.m._

Seto found Kisara in the bookstore in the far corner of the mall. It was an out-of-place hybrid of just-out hardcovers and tattered, but usable, paperbacks. There were also other reading and writing tools and general literary artifacts, again both of the old and new varieties. There were a lot fewer people in here.

Kisara was in the biographies section, paging through a piece on Charles Dickens with a small Macy's bag beside her while a stack of old newspapers from the eighties threatened to topple onto her from behind.

"Oh, hey," she said, noticing him. "Where's Mokuba?"

"He met up with some friends from school and is off gallivanting with them."

"You know," she began, holding up the biography, "despite how much it pisses me off how he treated his wife and children, I can't help but love _A Christmas Carol_."

"Bah. Humbug," Seto delivered on cue.

She chuckled as she put the book back. Crouching down she collected a stack she'd built up over the last twenty minutes. She had at least twelve already. As she stood up, the top of the pile began to shift and seemed to be preparing to tumble over.

Seto stepped over and caught them before they gave into gravity, balancing them back into Kisara's arms. Kisara grinned at him over the books. "Thanks, love," she murmured before leaning over and giving him a grateful, hidden kiss in the aisles of books with a load of books between them.

They pulled away as they heard someone shuffling around on the other side of the shelves. Seto straightened his hat which had become skewed and took half of Kisara's books from her and they both headed around towards the cashier.

There was a short line, which gave Kisara time to browse the journals on display. Seto had come to find that Kisara was a compulsive journal collector. He had no clue how many she already owned, but she'd been working in the same one for as long as he had known her. The one time that Seto had dared to comment on it, Kisara had noted his own penchant for Duel Monster card amassing even though he hardly needed as many as he had stored in his company's vault. He'd never opened the subject again and Kisara kept her mouth shut whenever he mentioned some rare card coming on sale or up for auction.

As they waited for their turn at the register, Seto looked around the shop. One novelty that came with shopping in actual stores was the variety of things that could present themselves to shoppers. Online shopping was for the most part a point-and-shoot sort of experience. Shopping in person caused you to look at things that you may not have known you needed or wanted. In this bookstore, besides the obvious literature, there were also paperweights in a glass case, old-fashioned quills and bottles of ink, homemade bookmarks, and some bookends. One bookend set in particular caught his attention, mainly due to the bright, shining silver plate that covered it and the tacky strands of tinsel that had been strung about it so as to deliberately catch potential customers' attention.

On one bookend was a statue of the Egyptian goddess Sekhmet on a throne. Seto wouldn't have known that except that Kisara had taken a college class this last semester on Egyptology that focused on the myths of the gods. The lion-headed goddess was shown to be rather bloodthirsty, but regal at the same time. Kisara had told him that at one point she had been somewhat considered to be one of the goddesses of beauty as well.

The other half of the set was of Sehkmet's consort, Ptah, likewise enthroned. There had been a less of an emphasis on him in Kisara's class, but Seto still knew a bit.

It was Kisara's turn to purchase her books. Two journals had made their way into her stack.

"Are we ready to go home now?" Kisara asked as she paid for her finds.

Seto nodded, and then paused. "I'll meet you at the car. There's something I need to get."

* * *

_December 23, 2012, 11:25 p.m._

The rarely used formal dining room off the kitchen was overflowing with wrapping paper, ribbon, and bows on the table, with still more materials having fallen to the floor and into the vacant chairs.

Seto and Kisara were having a blast over the little scene Seto had captured on his phone as they finished up wrapping some of the last few presents, candies, snacks, and drinks spread about them.

"Do you recognize any of them?" Kisara asked, taking another glance at the shot.

"I think the blonde with the pigtails might be Rebecca Hawkins. And that one with the reddish brown hair could be Wheeler's sister. The rest, I have no clue," Seto reported, using the blades of a pair of scissors to curl some silver ribbon just so. Nope, too much curl. It had to go.

Kisara watched in silence as Seto did away with the ribbon and started afresh. "That's your last present, isn't it?" Kisara asked.

"Yes."

"You've been spending quite a bit of time on it."

"Correct."

"More than any of your others. More than most of them combined," she continued.

"Hn."

She glared at him. "Who's it for, Seto, and why is it so important for you to wrap it so perfectly."

Seto looked up and glared back at her, trying to keep his face straight. "Mind your own business, Kisara."

"It's for me, isn't it?" Kisara pressed, her eyes lighting in excitement.

"You'll find out on Christmas," Seto snapped, a slight curve on his lips.

It was a standoff.

The kitchen door opened to allow Mokuba, both arms laden down with store bags, his hair dusted with snow due to the absence of his pompom-topped snow cap. He froze when he caught the identical evil twists on both his brother's and his brother's girlfriend's mouths. If it weren't for the fact that it was combined with amusement, Mokuba very well might have run for his life.

"Whatever it is, I didn't do it," he started off.

"Unfortunately for you, we have visual proof that you did," Seto said, sliding his phone forward.

"How are Ms. Hawkins and Ms. Wheeler?" Kisara asked.

Mokuba blushed. Then he seemed to recover himself. "They're fine."

"And the rest of them?" Seto asked, tangling his hands in ribbon once again.

"They're fine too," Mokuba answered, taking a seat next to Seto.

"Who are they?" Kisara prodded.

The blush deepened. "Just some friends from school." Mokuba began taking out packages and snatched some wrapping paper.

Kisara and Seto looked at one another. They could keep teasing Mokuba until he left in a frustrated little huff. But Kisara shook her head and Seto agreed. Having him around would be more entertaining in the long run and wouldn't have him angry at them.

Seto went back to his wrapping of the special present as Kisara changed the subject and engaged Mokuba in another conversation. One more short, curled length of ribbon would be it for this present, Seto thought.

He finished and picked the present up to take to the living room where they'd set up the tree. He felt Kisara's eyes on him the whole time.

The tree was spectacular, he had to admit as he placed the present underneath. The twinkling lights that had originally annoyed him in their inconsistencies had grown on him a tad, though the tinsel was a bit tacky.

He made his way back to the formal dining room. But he only found Mokuba there.

"Where did Kisara go?" Surely she hadn't gone home. She had her own room here at the mansion now when she wanted to make use of it. When she wasn't using Seto's room.

Mokuba's eyes widened and he shrugged. "She followed you out. I don't know where she went."

That schemer! Seto heard Mokuba calling after him as he raced back to the living room. He reached it and his suspicions were confirmed.

Kisara had snatched the present.

And now the chase was on.

* * *

_December 23, 2012, 11:56 p.m._

Kisara thought she lost Seto on the third floor, having ventured further into this particular wing of the mansion than she'd previously gone, past the room where she'd retrieved the wrapping things earlier in the night. She knew she'd gotten far when the mistletoe started to run dry, though she could still see a sprig a few halls down.

She slowed down, the package being heavier than she thought it would be. She wouldn't actually open it if he didn't want her too, but she was hyped up on sugar and Christmas spirit, wanting to have a little Yuletide fun with her boyfriend before the somewhat taxing, yet still enjoyable for her, experience at the mall spoiled him on the season.

She turned a corner, thinking of doubling back to the main part of the house so as to try and coax Seto into another bout of chasing. For a moment she thought she was looking into a mirror, coming face-to-face with a pair of cobalt eyes.

Anticipating her flight path, Seto had taken a shortcut through a servants' staircase and raced up to this area of the house to intercept her. He'd pulled the same sort of trick Kisara had in snatching the present in the first place. And now Seto had caught her.

Almost.

She just barely leaped clear of his grasping arms, quickly stepping back and turning back the way she'd come. She tore off for the main house. A shriek of delight ripped past her lips as she felt Seto's fingertips graze her back. He was hot on her heels.

If the present hadn't been weighing her down, Kisara might have been able to outpace him. As it was, she made it down much of the hallway, until the intersection that would have led her to the main staircase. Seto caught her there, wrapping his arms around her waist and essentially dragging her to a halt.

"Eep! Time-out!" Kisara shouted between bouts of laughter. She was sagging in his arms, unable to hold herself up because of the giddiness.

"What do you need a time-out for?" he asked her, his nose buried in her hair as he tried to snatch the present back.

Unwrapping one arm from her catch, Kisara pointed up, at the mistletoe bunch looming above them.

"Time-out?" Kisara repeated, having caught her breath a bit.

"Time-out."

* * *

_December 24, 2012, 12:00 a.m._

Seto smiled into the kiss, forgetting about the present between them as he ran his tongue across her lips and against her tongue.

Kisara had been chewing and licking at candy canes as they'd wrapped, leaving her lips and tongue red and the taste of her mouth fresh and sweet. Seto had been drinking coffee, and the two flavors mixed together as they kissed rivaled anything that Starbucks or whoever could have concocted.

The two of them kept kissing until the flavors dissipated and all they could taste anymore was each other. Finally they pulled back, but only just.

"Can I open my present now? Please?" she murmured against his lips.

He sighed contentedly and nodded, giving in. But he stole a couple more kisses first before pulling away. She kept a hold of his arm and made them both sit on the floor in the normally deserted area of the house.

Kisara merrily ripped through the dark blue paper with its pattern of gold snowflakes, shredding past the silver ribbon that Seto had carefully curled and tied.

He snorted as he watched all his hard work that had been what attracted her attention in the first place go to waste. Kisara smiled at him in apology. "It was beautiful, Seto," she assured him, taking the silver ribbon and draping it around his neck.

"Just open it." He was smiling too, not all that put out.

She reached the cardboard box that the shopkeeper had given Seto and began pulling at the tape holding it shut. Then dealt with the tissue paper beneath.

Kisara's breathing stopped when she finally reached the bookends themselves. She pulled out the one with Sekhmet on it and ran her fingertip over the face of the lioness-goddess. Next she took out Ptah and set the two side by side on the floor in front of her and Seto.

Suddenly her arms were wrapped around his torso and she was hugging him tightly to her.

"They're perfect."

"Of course they are," Seto replied imperiously, but he hugged her right back. "They're for all of those journals you keep buying."

Kisara laughed at that, snuggling her head into his shoulder.

"Merry Christmas, Kisara."

**Thanks for reading, and Merry Christmas! **

**Before it's asked, I wouldn't definitely say that Seto and Kisara remember their past in this fic. They may have inklings regarding it, but the events that took place then aren't in the fronts of either of their minds when they see each other.**


	4. New Year's Absence

**Welcome to this year's segment of ****Mistletoe Midnight****! Sorry for the delay this year, but I just got back from studying abroad in Japan for the semester and have been busy with family and trying to find something that can pass for a valid sleep schedule. Luckily this is the sort of story that can work with a little lateness. **

_December 31, 2013, 7:32pm._

Mokuba had made Seto swear to be home by Christmas. He'd done in hopes to get Mokuba off his back during the sudden planning and packing that had sprung up a week before the holiday when the necessity of paying a visit to a certain company that Seto had had the strong suspicion was about to back out of a deal with Kaiba Corporation had become apparent.

Seto was now sitting in the office of his hotel suite, waiting for his laptop to connect to the appallingly slow free Wi-Fi offered. He and Mokuba had an appointment to keep, though neither was likely looking forward to it.

Mokuba was already online when Seto managed to finally navigate to his Skype profile. Emails were no doubt waiting for him, but he was already a couple minutes late.

Seto almost smiled when he got a visual of Mokuba. It was his own expression of restrained anger, the one that promised wrath in the near future, borrowed and fitted to his younger brother's slightly darker features. Two weeks of not seeing each other gave Seto a new appreciation for Mokuba's changing face and the emotions they had started to express more and more frequently. He was getting a lot of practice noticing the small changes in those around him. Or, rather, not around him.

"Hi," Seto said.

No reply came.

"Happy New Years," Seto tried again, his voice sharper.

Mokuba rotated his shoulders, preparing. Seto unconsciously popped his knuckles, his own preparation for the oncoming encounter.

"Oh, yeah. Happy, happy, happy. I'm on the verge of exploding with all this _happiness_ infesting my insides and boiling my veins," Mokuba spat.

Being on the other side of the Kaiba-branded vitriol was not an experience Seto had come to enjoy over the last few months, though he had learned to anticipate it. Ever since Kisara had left, tensions that had just been budding had escalated to the point where they were at each other's throat as often as not.

She hadn't left for good, but she was far. She'd taken the year to study abroad, and she'd forbidden either Seto or Mokuba to visit her while she was in Japan. That Seto had, _reluctantly_, agreed to such an edict had been the source of his and Mokuba's first large feud, before she'd even bought her plane tickets.

"So, what's the excuse, then?" Mokuba asked, not interested in the pleasantries any more than Seto usually was.

"Things came up here. We nearly lost the deal. It was necessary—"

"You sound like every other old man in business who can't find time for their kids anymore. What kind of twenty-one-year-old acts like that?" Mokuba mocked.

"What sort of sixteen-year-old wants to spend Christmas with someone they'd describe like that?" Seto shot right back.

"This one did!" Mokuba shouted.

"You haven't wanted me around recently!" Seto yelled back. "Every time I come home, it seems I've done something else wrong, but now that I'm finally giving you the space you've been asking for since August—"

"You don't bail out on Christmas, Seto. You swore you'd be back for it," Mokuba reminded him.

"I needed to be here."

"No, you needed to be _here_," Mokuba said, pointing behind him to the darkness of his messy room, but meaning somewhere else entirely. "But, never mind. You don't have to explain. You had your reasons," Mokuba seemed to let him off.

"It was business, Mokuba. Nothing more," Seto stated.

"It was just me this year. Nothing more," Mokuba parroted. His voice was quiet now, and what Seto could see of him in the glow from the teenager's laptop was trembling.

Seto sat back and rubbed his face as Mokuba uncertain breathing filled their silence. The older brother gave way first. "I'm sorry, Mokuba," he said after a long swallow. "I tried to make it."

Mokuba snorted. "You're Seto _Kaiba_. If you'd really wanted to have been here, you would have been."

Seto's eyes narrowed. "I have responsibilities. And you—"

"It's getting close to midnight here. I have plans." Having said that, Seto watched Mokuba not bother with proper protocols and stab the power button into submission. His face vanished.

* * *

_December 31, 2013, 9:21pm._

Seto had been toying with some scraps and pieces of projects that were currently of no consequence when he saw another person he should have been spending the holidays with pop up in the corner of his laptop screen. Despite his recent bad experience, his heart beat a little more eagerly when he opened the video chat.

"Kisara," he said.

She smiled at him with her eyes and gave him a little wave as she took a sip of tea.

"What time is it there? It's already the new year, isn't it?"

"Yeah. It's… two-something in the afternoon, I think," Kisara guessed. She peaked out a curtained window immediately to her right and winced at the light streaming in. Her eyes were slightly bloodshot.

"Did your host mother take you drinking again?" Seto asked with a grin.

Kisara shrugged. "I could have said no… But I didn't." She'd developed her own devilish grin modeled on Seto's. "What time is it for you? Will you be popping champagne corks and wearing party hats soon?"

"Not for another few hours, and not this year, anyways," Seto answered.

"That's a rather grim caste you features have taken on. Tell me how it went with Mokuba," she said. Kisara had been kept abreast by both sides of the ongoing and various hostilities of the Kaiba house in her absence; she may as well have allowed them to see her with how often they kept in contact with each other through emails, chatting, phone calls, and care packages.

"Must I? It's a holiday," Seto tried to wriggle out of explaining what had carried on.

"You must," Kisara confirmed, leaning forward. "From the beginning, if you please."

Seto did start there, and he carried on and on about other issues between him and his brother, though Kisara had heard it all before. This led to a development in Kisara's host family's family, which led to Seto asking other questions and Kisara showing him some of the articles she'd picked up over the holidays. They carried on for the few hours left remaining before Seto's year became new.

Seto felt a vibration in his pocket and pulled out his phone as Kisara left for a moment to refill her teacup.

'_Happy New Years. Tell K, too,'_ the text from Mokuba said.

Kisara caught him staring at his phone when she returned. "What is it?"

"Mokuba says Happy New Years. He's a few minutes early," Seto said, checking the hotel suite's office's clock.

When he put his phone away and looked up again, Kisara was looking at him tenderly. "Happy New Years, Seto."

She kissed to giners and placed them on her screen, where his lips would have been.

* * *

_January 1, 2013, 12:00am._

Pressing two kissed fingers of his own against the screen where Kisara's lips were displayed through pinkened pixels hardly compared to touching them in real life. There was no give, no warmth, and he hardly felt as though he were being kissed seeing her arm extended and knowing that her fingers were likewise caressing his own mouth.

But the sentiment was there. He missed her so much.

Seto sighed. "Maybe Mokuba was right and I did have other reasons for not making it home in time."

"Oh?" Kisara's eyelids fluttered. Seto had no doubt she would slump her way back into slumber soon after they finished this session, tea or no tea. Drinking always did her in, and he'd caught her nearly nodding off several times during their conversation.

"Mm-hm. If you'd been home, I'd have been there, too," he confessed.

"Oh? It's my fault now?"

"No. But it wouldn't have felt like Christmas without you there… without the unwanted baking and present-snatching—"

Kisara interrupted him with her laughter, the unexpected force of it causing her to slosh tea onto her sweater sleeve. "Now I'll be the one blaming you for making me make a mess of my host parents' home."

"Tell them I said hello," Seto said, having met them through this same electronic medium a few times and liking them despite the language barriers. He was already planning, had been planning with Mokuba, ways to help Kisara cope with missing them when she returned.

"I will. Enjoy the new year, Seto. Just half of one more before we're both back."

"Half a year," Seto breathed, with both hope and sadness clouding his voice and his eyes.

Kisara nodded. "Call Mokuba in the morning, Seto. I don't want to come home to find the two of you broken against each other."

Seto chuckled. "I'll try."

"You're Seto Kaiba. You don't try; you do."

"That's what Mokuba said. I knew you were on his side."

They parted with each other with smiles and laughter. And though Seto was worried about his next confrontation with Mokuba, he was resolved, in more ways than one.

Next year he would definitely be home for Christmas.

**Thank you for reading, and I wish you all a Happy New Years! **

**I hope you enjoyed this chapter and what has become a true holiday tradition for me, and I hope this will be the only chapter that misses Christmas proper, but thank you all for bearing with it. **


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